Day 25 - No sugar

Read why here:
Day 25

No sugar for 24 hours should strike fear into the hearts of most people, unless you, like me, are on a very specific diet that eliminates just about every form of sweetener or sugar known to man. I have SIBO (small intestine bacterial overgrowth) and my food intake is restricted to food that is low in FODMAPS. What are FODMAPS? Well they are:
fructose - the no-nos include fructose, high fructose, honey, fruisana and corn syrup, but also include a lot of fruit that is high in fructose such as apples, mangos, watermelons and any tinned fruit.
lactose - no milk from animals (cow, sheep, goat), or products made with this milk, no soft unripened cheeses such as cottage or cream cheese.
fructans - many vegetables such as onions and broccoli, no wheat products, no pistachio
galactans - no beans or legumes
polyols - anything that ends in -ol such as sorbitol, mannitol, isomalt, maltitol, and xylitol and more fruit and vegetables - including the Banting staple cauliflower.

I carry my infographic around with me in case I need to check what I can have to eat...

So, as you can see going 24 hours without sugar really was no hardship for me. Going without mangos - well now, that is just a travesty! Giving up avocados would have been difficult if I was still living in South Africa where they are plentiful and delicious, but in Egypt they are difficult to find, extremely expensive and not very good. So I have come to terms with that one. Luckily, I can still bananas. I don't know what my digestive system would do without its banana a day!

My continuous challenge is to combine a low FODMAPS diet with a Paleo diet, and I think I'm doing quite well with that.

I love trolling the interwebs for recipes. There are lots and lots of websites with Paleo recipes, so in honour of this challenge I had a look around for sugar-free recipes. I was very disappointed. Most of the so-called sugar-free recipes and websites use lots of sugar substitutes like stevia, mashed dates, and applesauce.

I wanted to find a truly sugar-free recipe, but the only one I could find was for granola. Go figure. It seems that the human desire for something sweet is overwhelming, and people must have it.

I did find some interesting information though, about sugar and how bad it is for you - never mind the obvious effects of obesity and caries.

My sugar intake is relatively low, I'm proud to say, and it seems to be helping my gut heal, so I will be keeping it that way.